Cloud transforms IT function

Cloud computing will one day becoming a utility similar to electricity.

This is according to Mirek Novotny, HP Software and Solutions for Europe, Middle East and Africa, who addressed business and IT decision-makers during the ITWeb Cloud Computing conference, held in Bryanston, yesterday.

“IT is shifting from just providing the technology to driving services supporting the business objectives. The next step will be about ever-present applications that provide business value,” said Novotny.

One of the biggest challenges IT faces is the management of large-scale data centres. Novotny explained that HP had 85 data centres around the globe with over 6 000 applications, which cost the giant 4% of its revenue. He said HP consolidated its data centres to become more flexible and easier to manage, which led to a 50% drop in energy and running costs.

“Instead of having applications managed within the data centre itself, you can outsource the applications, where it's hosted for the business. Instead of having silo-ed applications running on dedicated servers, you start building better utilisation of resources.

“The implications of cloud computing is that there's a transformation of the IT function. Instead of being just a cost centre, the IT department needs to become the key partner of the business to enable growth.”

According to Novotny, analysts expect that everyone will be using some form of cloud computing in the near future. He pointed to examples such as Saleforce.com bringing business processes to the cloud.

“Tomorrow's business will be built on a converged infrastructure. Gartner says cloud computing will be the number one technology for 2010,” he noted.

“Cloud computing is also about the flexibility of deploying applications quickly and the ability to switch them off if needed. It's about having access to those service from any location and from any device.”